My Downtown Seattle Republican Club interview with Armen Yousoufian about his Public Disclosure Act lawsuit is now available on streaming video at the Seattle Channel. The program will be broadcast on the Seattle Channel (Comcast 21 in Seattle) this evening at 9pm and repeated throughout the week.

Armen tells quite a good story about how he initially asked King County Executive Ron Sims' office for documents about the Kingdome/Seahawks Stadium proposal shortly before the 1997 vote. After months of stonewalling, he took the County to court for violating the state Public Disclosure Act and sued to obtain the remaining undisclosed documents, statutory fines and recovery of legal fees. Seven years and numerous court decisions later, the state Supreme Court issued a mixed ruling in Armen's favor and sent his case back to a lower court to recalculate his award. A fascinating tale of governmental arrogance, dishonesty, incompetence and yes, probably some bona fide corruption. Armen is quite the hero for fighting back and holding King County accountable. Watch the whole thing.

[Coincidentally, Armen is also pictured in this photo from today's Seattle Times article about yesterday's Critical Areas Ordinance protest. Armen is to the right of the guy with the big black cowboy hat].

Upcoming events at the Downtown Seattle Republican Club:
11/29: Democrat Shoreline City Councilmember and former County Councilmember Maggie Fimia, speaking on "Bipartisan solutions to regional problems"
1/24/2005: Seattle School Superintendent Raj Manhas, on the School District's Five Year Plan